


living with all your joy and sadness

by joouheika



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: F/F, Manga Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-06
Updated: 2015-02-06
Packaged: 2018-03-10 17:43:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3298574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/joouheika/pseuds/joouheika
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's sure of this one thing. [post chapter 66]</p>
            </blockquote>





	living with all your joy and sadness

Historia is dreaming.

They are walking through a field of flowers and Ymir follows her close behind.

A bright and sunny day, the sky a bright blue. Not as blue as the flowers that are about their feet. Historia turns, her skirt swirling about her ankles, her hair longer than she remembers. Like it’d been when she’d first joined the Training Corps. But she’d been having trouble with it, Ymir had suggested she put it up like she does with her clip. Historia had… Krista had tried that out. She’d trimmed it a bit, liking Mikasa’s idea of cutting her hair, but she hadn’t wanted to cut that much. She’d been fond of long hair for a while. She remembers both Ymir and Mikasa’s long dark hair had brought her a sense of happiness, she’d not known why, she remembers it must have been because of Frieda now.

Frieda with her long dark hair, her kind eyes and gentle hands.

Frieda who had stayed with her in fields such as this and spoke to her until the sun went down. With night it became like a long dream she could never remember, no matter the amount she slept, no matter from when she woke.

Ymir and her walk a little more before they come before a fence.

What is over it, Historia has always wanted to know.

What sort of flowers grow there?

In these fields… but Frieda had warned her to not go beyond the fence.

Ymir is besides her now, complaining of the sun, wiping her brow. Telling Historia what strong legs she got, she’s much shorter than her but she’s not breaking a sweat under this sun is she?

Ymir flashes her a smile, says something else Historia doesn’t entirely catch- then Ymir starts to climb over the fence.

It’s not at all tall but panic squeezes at her throat and seizes her chest. Historia grabs at Ymir’s arm.

“You mustn’t! You can’t!”

Ymir looks at her and scoffs.

“What are you getting all worked up over? How else are we supposed to continue if we stop here? We have to climb-”

Instead of tearing her hand away or pushing her away. Ymir is holding her hand.

“Are you afraid of some dumb ol’ fence? If I can climb it you definitely can climb it. Don’t be stupid.”

She’d never feared climbing the fence, nor what laid behind it… only the look in Frieda’s eyes as she told her she can’t-

That’s right, why can’t she? 

It’s not Frieda who is here with her now but Ymir.

And with Ymir-

There is nothing she cannot do!

Historia grabs at Ymirs hand who turns to her perplexed, that she is being stopped from climbing over the fence again but Historia is clutching at her hand. Ymir’s hand that is so real here, in her dreams, in her so often unreliable, altered memories. There is not a single person on this earth she will allow to take this memory from her.

“Ymir!”

Ymir is still looking at her as Historia looks at her.

“Take me with you! Over the fence!”

Ymir is holding her hand back still but-

“Dummy, didn’t I say it already? There’s nothing stopping you from climbing this fence… by yourself. You don’t need me to climb this fence.”

Historia nods but continues- more aggressive than before-

“That’s not what I’m saying at all Ymir! Of course I don’t _need_ you to climb the fence! But I _want_ to climb the fence with you!”

Ymir is startled, then a little red in the face, from the sun surely-

“Then what are we wasting all this time for! Let’s hurry up and climb this damn fence then!”

Their hands part and it’s over the fence with the warmth of Ymir’s hands that Historia climbs the fence and on reaching the other side-

“I did it! Ymir, we did it!”

Historia turns but Ymir is not at her side.

The fence and the field of flowers gone. All that is behind her is a towering wall of stone, Historia presses her hands to it in sudden alarm. Where is Ymir?

She turns from the wall.

The flowers she had wondered to lie beyond the fence, are an entanglement of thorny red roses. The likes of which she’s not sure she can get through. If Frieda were still here it’d be many a thorn not only from her hands that’d had to be pulled.

Within the shadow of the wall, Historia thinks.

Which path should she take if Ymir is not here with her now?

Had Ymir managed to climb that fence?

Had she raced through the roses and is she waiting for Historia now? Or is she still behind the fence, behind this wall?

You cannot go back.

There is no way back.

Nothing is reversible.

What has been done is done.

Even so, even if it is history, a fading memory-

Historia has already decided, no one is going to take Ymir from her, not even herself.

She turns and toeing off her sandals she starts to climb the wall, with whatever crack or crevice her feet and soon bleeding fingers can get into she climbs, not afraid of the fall, not afraid of anything. If she dies, then she dies! If she lives then she lives! If she is alive then there is a chance to see Ymir again and she wants to see her.

Ymir was always telling her to live for herself and choose what it is she wants.

What she wants is Ymir.

She has spent her entire life, living it not as her own, living to die for others, living to live for others, living for everyone other than herself. All because when asked what it is she will live for, what it is she will die for. She has never known the answer to that.

Ymir had taught her.

Ymir who said she didn’t care about anyone but herself. Ymir who is greedy and foulmouthed, selfish and needy, quick to anger others and turn tail if it is her neck at stake. Ymir who lives all for herself. 

Ymir who said that but still ran after her.

Ymir who still risked her life for her, all of them.

Ymir who listens to her.

Ymir who was the first to hold her close.

To have touched her as if it were the most natural thing in this world.

Ymir who divulged her greatest secret to her.

Ymir who gave her power over her.

And because of that, Historia can do anything when Ymir is by her side.

If Historia is to live for herself then-

She wants to ask Ymir.

If Ymir is truly only living for herself, all alone, then why had she given Historia this choice? To meet her father, to possibly take the world- to learn everything that is ever known. When she had strove to rob her of the future? Why had Ymir who says she never gives a damn, given such a damn?

Blood from her cracked nails is flowing down her wrists, against her dress, warm on her face (like Eren’s had-), she almost loses her grip from the slickness of it, but manages to find her grip again. Some where Ymir is near, she had just been by her side- she could not have gotten away so quickly- no matter how fast her titan form is- she is always searching for her, like Historia is always searching for her-

She makes it to the top of the wall.

Standing upon it the sun has long set and night is dimmed by the bright stars up ahead.

She’s panting, elated, excited, she has climbed the wall all on her own.

She steps forward and looking over the edge, back to where Ymir might be, what she sees-

It is black, a darkness unmatchable to even that of the void within her.

She can see nothing.

She can see everything.

She steps away from the edge and looks over to the side she’d just been at, the roses with their thorns had been in full bloom, all their petals are scattered away and no longer is she upon the wall but a tall tower.

Must she climb down from such a place?

If that is what it takes to find Ymir then-

No.

That is not what she wants to do.

Hadn’t she told Ymir at this very tower as Ymir had said to her many times before- “Live for yourself! Who cares about the rest of us!” 

Historia looks around the top of her tower.

There’s cannons and ammunition. 

She knows what she wants to do.

She will destroy this tower.

She loads the cannons, she will use them to break through the rock along the sides, and about her feet. If she falls into that abyss before her then she may die or she may live, but this is the only way she wants to take.

It is the only way she is certain will bring her closer to Ymir.

She lights a match, another, another, another, all the fuses of the cannons lit.

The tower falls, and so does she.

She falls into the dark and then just as sudden as day had become night, it is bright.

Through that tangle of thorns she is cut on, her clothes torn, her skin bleeding, she closes her eyes for a moment, opening them to the white she has fallen into. Her garb had once been as white and pristine and is no longer.

The mouth of a titan swallows her up and she curls up into herself.

Will she try to wrench her way from this place, with all the thorns now on her body?

She uses them to cut the inside of the titan’s mouth. Only that steel they use as soldiers can cut a titan’s flesh and skin on the outside but inside-

The titan spits her out and steam rises from its rather small frame. Its flesh melts and a cradle of bones holds a familiar figure. She rushes to them. Her bruised and bloody feet step not over more blood but the flown away rose petals. Not a thorn among them.

Ymir is resting among those bones. Her eyes closed.

The bone is hot, and it burns what of her skin that happens to press against it. But if she tries to avoid the heat, she will not be able to reach Ymir.

How peacefully she looks, like she is sleeping, Historia thinks. It's a little funny to her to think she's thought of Ymir as 'peaceful'.

She bends forth to kiss Ymir.

A memory that cannot be taken from her.

Historia opens her eyes, the feeling of Ymir’s lips still on hers in the dark room.

She sits up and sees someone is at her bedside. Their hair dark but not long.

It is Mikasa, who stirs on seeing she is awake.

She must have been resting her eyes, but listening carefully for any possible intruders.

Mikasa’s gaze is a little distant, as if it is not Historia Mikasa is entirely seeing, caught in her own memories.

“…why are you crying?”

Mikasa asks her.

Historia laughs a little, Mikasa’s eyes widen in mild surprise.

Historia wipes at the tears in her eyes.

“And I had called Eren a cry baby… but I am not crying from sadness, it’s from happiness.”

Mikasa is listening, her gaze on Historia’s face.

“It was a beautiful dream I just had, the likes of which I’m not used to.”

Historia swears Mikasa is smiling a little at that.

“I think… I understand.”

To Historia a dream she remembers.

That is a good dream.


End file.
